Wiggins expects to be frozen out of Team Sky’s nine-man squad and admitted he is “gutted” to miss the peloton’s take-off from Yorkshire next month.

Sir Brad’s exclusion from cycling’s biggest circus will almost certainly hasten his departure from Sky - and possibly lead to a return indoors, with a fifth Olympic gold medal in Britain’s team pursuit quartet in Rio 2016 in his sights.

Wiggins shocked the nation on BBC’s ­Breakfast News by revealing: “As it stands, I won’t be on the Tour. The team is focused around Chris Froome, the defending champion , who has a great chance of winning his second Yellow Jersey.

“I’m gutted, I’ve worked extremely hard for this all winter up to the Tour of California and winning that, and I feel I’m in the form I was when I won the 2012 Tour de France.

“But at the end of the day, it’s about the team winning, and it’s up to Team Sky.

“As defending champion, Chris has a say in who rides around him, and he’s had guys who have gone to all his ­build-up races and training camps while I’ve been following a different path.

“As it gets closer, Dave Brailsford [Team Sky principal] has to decide who is best fitted to do that job, but Chris and I have not raced together all year.

“There is a race in the South of France this weekend [the Criterium du Dauphine], where Chris will have his guys around him. There is still a chance I could come into the team if Chris crashes, or the set-up of the team changes.

“But all being well, Chris stays fit and healthy and the team will roll out of Leeds without me.”

(Image: Getty)

Millions of fans are expected to line the route for the Tour’s first three stages – two in Yorkshire on July 5-6, the other from Cambridge to London – and nobody did more to attract the race to these shores than 34-year-old Wiggins, Britain’s first Yellow Jersey winner in 2012 .

And while Froome, 29, will be afforded the full might of Sky’s arsenal as defending champion next month, Wiggins sadly observed that privilege was denied him – mostly due to illness and injury – 12 months ago.

“As a former winner, and with the Grand Depart in Britain, it would have been great to be there. I miss riding the Tour – I missed not being able to come back as defending champion and I will miss it this year.”